Some days, she didn't know why she still tried. Why she still got up. Because Katarina felt nothing but empty. So different from how she used to be. Before the burden of memory claimed her.
It was a constant feeling. Not boredom, not nothingness, no, emptiness. Like there was something missing inside of her. Like she was hollow. Though, that's not always the case.
It used to be easy for her to find feeling in small, insignificant things, while the brunt of the world and her memories and predestined power took their toll on her. Things that could fill a part of the gaping hole inside of her. Gardening. Reading. Even inane thing as breathing.
Food or sweets in general, for example, were the simplest of things, and yet the spark of pleasure eating them gave her filled the gaping hole inside of her just a tiny bit each time. Just a tiny portion of her hollowed self.
Or her "friends" and "fiance", and the fake smiles she'd give to them as she dragged them from location to location, all while she made herself look as cheerful as possible. The way they'd smile back at her. Just once...she wants to smile genuinely with them. For them. Not just her usual fake smile. Not like her obligatory smile for her family.
She did smile genuinely. Once, when she just a Katarina Claes, daughter of Miri Diana Claes and Luigi Claes. Just her. Alone in her own mind, with no baggage of memory of bad end.
Nowadays, though, it was as if every part of her had been hollowed out. As if not a single part was anything more than an empty shell, not even capable of such a simple task as feeling.
She'd been the same as always, normal even, mere weeks prior. But everything added up, and she wasn't sure when the emptiness started eating away at her to such a severe degree. But she couldn't do anything about it.
One year ago, Katarina had almost felt as if the hole had been filled and covered for good, at the accusation of her supposed bullying of Maria Campbell by a group of possessed students. The first thing Lady Fate had done for her that wasn't some twisted imitation of her once a beloved game. She hoped she just died or had been exiled then. Her burden would be gone, and her emptiness will never bother her again.
She survived. Now? It was still there, an aching feeling she could never quite shake, but for that short time she'd been free, and it'd felt as insignificant as the things she'd used as comfort beforehand.
But when the accusation doesn't work, they came back. The emptiness. Of course, they had. Things didn't work out well for Katarina Claes, they never had. The first good thing of this caliber to happen to her since her reincarnation has cost her feelings, and the original selves of Katarina Claes have been robbed like everything else.
It could almost be considered poetic in a way if she thought about it more gloomily than she already was. She who has everything is rewarded nothing. It was very fitting.
The hole had proceeded to carve itself back out after that, bigger and deeper than it had ever been before. A numbness that gripped her so strongly that even her favorite food couldn't combat it.
Once again, she felt empty.
And this time, she felt more self-hatred for herself than she'd ever had beforehand. She had everything, no struggles, and should be on top of the world. Her position and future powers were a blessing, after all. But she didn't feel that way, had never been able to feel that way.
After all, her position was the very thing welding the shovel, expanding her own emptiness.
Katarina wondered why she was still trying to feel most days. Unlike before, it seemed impossible. She'd been robbed of her one dream, of freedom, and the ability to simply feel. Once when she fell. Twice at the framing of Katarina Claes.
She was stuck with her curse of knowledge and unfeeling, and the universe was eager to keep it that way. So no matter what she tried, as long as she was still here, they were there to stay.
But that brought the most obvious of questions. Why was she still here? Surely, her powers couldn't persist in something as final as death. No one can revive the dead, after all. She probably can, the voice at the back of her mind supplied.
It would fill her hole. Remove her curse. So why? Why was she still clinging onto a life she didn't want?
Well, she was smart. In her own twisted way. It wasn't too hard to connect dots, even in her limbic-worn brain, one that had long since had its components mentally broken.
She was scared. Scared of what she'd leave behind. And truly, it was the most idiotic notion. One could say it was stupider than her when she was drunk.
She was scared of what she'd do to her friends and family. Friends that...cared about her. A family that would miss her. Friends that would be broken without her part of their group. Family she loved.
Katarina had never been able to convince herself the once NPC she reluctantly called friends would get over her death.
Maybe it was for the best. No one else had been able to rip the shovel away from her powers that wielded it consistently.
Maybe she would stay. For them. And maybe one day, her emptiness would fade once again.
Wishful thinking. But that's not wrong, is it?
As if. She will always be empty.